Yeah, so I wasn't sure about this, but in case of a mass exodus, didn't want to be left behind, so I made an account. Was going to be kuteki like always, but then realised that a change would be nice and seeing as katia was available, I thought I might as well. I am still a bit confused about the whole subscribe/give access thing, and have no plans to move, but I can see the appeal. And am in the process of importing all my entries, which if it works, will be pretty awesome!

Off to look for you guys there now! And if you have a different name please let me know!

...All staff and students are now encouraged to take the following simple precautionary measures which have been shown to be effective in reducing the transmission of all viruses - details of these measures are being posted throughout the School - this information is also being widely disseminated in the national press, on health agency websites and elsewhere:

* Cover your nose and mouth when coughing or sneezing, using a tissue when possible. * Dispose of dirty tissues promptly and carefully. * Maintain good basic hygiene, for example washing hands frequently with soap and water to reduce the spread of the virus from your hands to face or to other people...

Emphasis mine, because really it is such a novel idea to cover you mouth when sneezing, it would have never occurred to me before! The whole thing is getting a bit ridiculous.

Have said I will do this a few times now, so please comment on this entry, and I will:

1. Tell you why I friended you.2. Associate you with something - fandom, a song, a color, a photo, a word etc.3. Tell you something I like about you.4. Tell you a memory I have of you.5. Ask something I've always wanted to know about you.6. Tell you my favorite user pic of yours.7. In return, you must post this in your LJ.

So now that the important stuff is out of the way... I went to Oxford today, had an absolutely lovely day. It was warm and the sky was blue with fluffy white clouds which looked painted on. Took two American LSE friends and we went sightseeing, and punting (they were both immediately better than me, I can't steer at all) and took photos and had cream tea and now I am home and feel really sick. :( Not sure what is wrong, I just feel unwell, I think I am being punished for having a day off, which was supposed to be a celebration for finishing my essays but I haven't started writing the second one. I fail. A lot.

In better news, I am really excited about the Gossip Girl spin off, especially because there are rumours that it will be a crossover with the OC, as Lily will be living in California in the 80s will know teenage Kirsten and Jimmy Cooper! And if these two shows are in each other's canon it gives me ideas. Because Serena got into Brown and Summer went to Brown, and now I want to read a Serena/Summer fic...

See I haven't posted for a week because I was in London for a few days and have been in the library and there are a lot of serious and important things I have wanted to talk about. Some other time maybe. Because this I need to share, even if no one is going to care.

You see, I LOVE Lily Cole, she is one of my favourite models (yes, I have favourite models, don't you all?) She is just so pretty and her shoots are so different and versatile and she is in Cambridge now, battling the dumb model stereotype pretty well, and she is great in St. Trinians and she is a redhead and I really have a thing for redheads, whatever. ANYWAY, I got on the fast train to Milton Keynes and three girls and a guy got in after me and I looked up and saw one of the girls putting up a bag and thought HUH she looks so much like Lily Cole, super tall and pretty (and people that say models aren't pretty in person, so wrong in this case!) and really the hair is amazing and a second later I realised that it is in fact LILY COLE! And so I sat behind her for 40 minutes and they all got off at Milton Keynes of all places, and was squeeing internally while pretending to read my article, and trying to not eavesdrop on their conversation. Apparently the Cambridge Amnesty Soc have asked her to do a speech.

Am impressed she sat in standard class, though she did have a Macbook Air (and was looking at pictures on it!) and (i'm pretty sure) Channel sunglasses.

She was wearing colourful trainers with quite a thin sole, skinny jeans, a long light grey cardi and a really beautiful leather jacket. Okay don't judge me, this is important!

I do hope those of you who celebrate had a lovely weekend, and those of you in the UK are having a fantastic four day weekend, my Easter is next week, so I was supposed to write my first extended essay. It is 4000 words on a topic that I am incredibly fascinated by (Am looking at Critical IR Theory and its tendency to fail at being critical because of its Western origin making it implicitly Eurocentric) and yet I didn’t.

And now a few things that have been on my mind, sort of ranty, but not really.

On Colin Morgan/Bradley James: They are just so precious. I have been reading fic and writing fic (A few thousand words for Merlin big bang, rewriting is a bitch, so I changed things round) and best of all falling for Colin and Bradley. So people have mentioned the Merlin DVD commentary before, but I had never seen it and then I did and it was pretty great, I love Colin’s accent and Bradley’s face, you guys I get it about Bradley’s face now and then I watched lots more stuff with them on youtube (This is some priceless commentary) and then I wrote more fic. I’ve never written RPS before, first time for everything, I guess. It’s not completely finished, and I need to write my essay, but I will probably post it later today.

On Amazonfail: Amazon responded, apparently it was just a glitch, don’t you just love that word? Someone fucked up, but a glitch explains it all. I am not saying I am not glad, because I really am and also so proud at the way this issue was publicised, I saw one of the original posts on it yesterday morning, signed the petition (there were less than a 100 signatures at that time) and then went on to read more epic Arthur/Merlin and a few hours later when I checked my flist it seemed the internet had exploded, and despite it being Easter everyone was around and outraged, from Neil Gaiman to Jezebel and this morning the petition has over 10 000 signatures. And that is pretty amazing, it just really pleases me what we can as a community achieve.

On Twitter: this is related to the above, because I have always been firmly against twitter, mostly because of the people who post all their tweets here which is incredibly irritating, but also because I don’t care what people I know or celebrities I love do every hour of every day and I think that this reflects the obsession with reality tv and it freaks me out a little bit, I mean what is next? Everyone is going to carry a camera pointed at their head for 24hr footage? And also when you do see people what do you talk about, when you already know everything they have done? But I am slowly changing my mind about this because I saw yesterday how useful Twitter can be for publicising things and I guess it can have its uses. Not that I am going to sign up, FB status updates are enough for me!

Day 1 in the library without a laptop has been more than productive, have become super paranoid though and log a huge stack of books with me even during coffee breaks. The situation is Not That Bad, because I have wonderful friends who will give me notes, I had in fact emailed a fair amount of things to myself and I hadn't actually read that much in the first place, I am still upset, but trying not to think about it. Am now using mum's old laptop and readjusting myself to XP (probably only person in world to actually like Vista...)

I am extremely disaster prone when it comes to computers, the speed with which I go through laptops is actually pretty spectacular and this one had survived without spontaneously combusting for 15 months, so it was clearly time for it to go. (seriously I went trawling through old posts to try and find accounts of previouslaptopdisasters, though I am sure there are at least two more)

Anyway, the reason for this post is that apart from notes, photos, music and films I also lost my bookmarks (yes I am weird and outdated and don't understand how del.icio.us works, so it was all in my browser) so now I have lost all the Merlin fic I had planned on reading. (and my big bang, but let's not talk about that now) Some would say that is a good thing, as I have to study, but really I just want long Merlin/Arthur AUs and haven't got the time to thrawl through comms too find it...

So PLEASE REC ME MERLIN FICS, or even better rec lists, any really, I haven't been reading very much recently, so please don't leave out the obvious fic that everyone has read, as chances are that's exactly what I can't remember the title of and have been looking for!

So I was sitting in Shakespeare's head in Holborn with a couple of friends, a pub I have been in many, many times, I was trying to cheer my friend up because her laptop was stolen at King's Cross a few days ago and she has exams in three weeks, and then I said, we should all be careful, let me just check my laptop is still here and upon looking under the table discovered that in fact it was gone! GONE! MY BEAUTIFUL LAPTOP AND worst of all EVERYTHING ON IT, ALL MY NOTES, ALL OF THEM! (And photos and music and films and fic and EVERYTHING!) You see TWO days ago the memory stick on which I had saved everything was acting really weird, saying it was full when it wasn't and I needed to transfer some photos and DELETED everything from it and hadn't got round to re-saving it. TWO days ago, I deleted my back up,. I am so so stupid. Also screwed. This is possibly my worst nightmare, to revise for exams with no notes. It's like the year is gone.

There was CCTV footage of the guy taking it, but his face was hidden, so nothing could be done, of course.

Then I was really upset, only to get to Euston and find out that I have to wait for a train for over an hour!! As opposed to the usual at most 10 minutes wait. And then I cried like a crazy person in the middle of the station.

So I accidentally deleted my poll while trying to fix the formatting of my post and now I feel utterly stupid, so here is a poll again and my apologies to those who already voted![Poll #1362070][Poll #1362070]

So, in a moment of madness I signed up to boxofmagic that is Merlin Big Bang. To be fair they have a minimum word count of 15000 words which isn't that much and yet at the same time I will have to do exams, a dissertations and two extended essays. So. Madness. But also I am really excited about it!

So, should be working, but have been reading fic and have come to the following conclusions:

I am currently all about the romance and the AUs, nothing angsty, just sunshine and daisies and snark. harlequinmerlin has been good to me. In particular Lord Drake's Bequest by pennyplainknits which I am sure everyone has read, but if you haven't you should!

I love it when fics are set somewhere I know, with all the lovely familiar details making a very good fic even better, this applies to a great number of fics set in London, but especially to the Oxford Rowing AU Easy There bysyllic which is my new favourite thing ever, and everyone should read, but especially if you know Oxford as it is utterly delightful to read about Arthur and Merlin going to the Noodle Bar and the Rose and makes me almost nostalgic about my brief rowing days. And it is utterly lovely.

There isn't a fic which doesn't use 'prat' more than once or 'worst manservant ever' and shockingly this is not annoying but sweet and 'despoiling' is also everywhere and I don't mind, in fact I have developed mad love for that word.

Everyone thinks Arthur is much hotter than Merlin and I disagree! I know Bradley is attractive and all but it is all about Colin for me, especially when he has a bit of a stubble and the ears are adorable and oddly add to his hotness. So in honour of my newly (re)purchased paid account (needed all my extra icons!) here is a poll.

P.S Happy International Women's day! The 8th of March has always been celebrated in Bulgaria and it is nice to see it become a bit more prominent here in recent years!

I don’t know if any of you are still watching Heroes, as it really did go downhill, but yesterday I caught up on the last two episodes and they were fantastic! For the first time since probably season 1 I truly enjoyed watching it, so that I had to pause it to flail and write down quotes and yell for my brother to squee at him. So much of it was so good. Some less so. Now I am craving a long plotty fic explaining what the fuck happened to Nathan (bodysnatch? Pls?) and how him and Peter reunite and it is wonderful. But until I find that. My thoughts. Well, noncoherent squee. Same thing.

And a meme tagged by the_sea_to: Comment to this post and I will give you five subjects/things I associate with you. Then post this to your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given.

Clothing: Yeah I love clothes. I already made a post to that effect and the number of fashion blogs I frequent has grown quite a bit since. As has my tights collection. Every day I get on the bus from Euston to Holborn, sit on top at the front and look outside judging people’s outfits. Since it’s central London, this is so fun! I’ve been attempting to take photos of my daily outfits, not because I think I am awesome, but because I am curious as to what I wear and try to not repeat an outfit, but keep forgetting to do it, so the result is not very accurate, but the photos I have are growing. I sort of want to post them, but doubt this is the right place for it.

Travel: I guess I am quite lucky as have done quite a lot of travelling in the last few years, though there is so much more I want to see. I am not really a holiday person, and by that I mean going somewhere to do nothing but relax/sun bathe/drink, when I go somewhere I need to see everything. I adore different cultures, the food, the atmosphere of places and though I do go to the museums and galleries my favourite thing is to simply walk around the streets and look at people and buildings and take a million photos. I try to avoid the super touristy areas and see what the parts which are not the city centre are like, try more authentic food and talk to local people. I am so looking forward to going to Barcelona soon. Especially since I have been before, as there is something wonderful about revisiting places

Oxford: is one of my favourite places. I did my degree there and lived there for three years and I don’t want to sound like a cliché but they were the best years of my life. It was wonderful, a lot of work, sometimes too much but also a lot of fun and really fantastic people. As for the city itself I never really got used to its spectacular beauty, the river before proper sunrise, cold and ethereal (rowing was good for something), the Covered Market filled with shops selling pearls and dresses and the scent of Ben’s cookies, the oldest Oxfam, which I could never enter without purchasing something ridiculous, the Cowley road graffiti, all the colleges of course, everything else.

Fanfiction: I still read and haven’t written in a very long time. Though I have a fantastic idea about an Arthur/Merlin fashion AU, a sort of The Devil Wears Prada meets Ugly Betty. with Uther as Miranda and Gaius as Nigel. Arthur is Daniel and Merlin as the clueless writer who has no idea about fashion at all and accidentally gets a job as Arthur’s personal assistant. Arthur tortures him of course but Merlin’s idiocy is sort of endearing and he accidentally saves the day a few times and Arthur slowly falls for him. Will is Nate and Morgana is Alexis and Gwen is Lily and I so want to write this. What do you guys think?

New people: I like new people, both in RL and in LJ, looking at my flist it looks like I need some new faces as half of you haven’t posted in forever and I hardly share a fandom with most of you, but at the same time I am not a big fan of change.

I am really pleased about the Oscars, though that maybe because the only nominated films I'd actually seen were Slumdog and Milk and really love Kate but still.

In other news, I have to do THREE essays this week and a presentation and I am scared. I have no idea why I left things so late, but I have and now should just write essay number one, only it needs to be good, because it is in the class where my other essay was bad and my presentation was really bad and my tutor must think I am stupid. Need to prove him wrong, but am unable to write this essay. I don't know why, it is an interesting topic (Feminist Security Theory) and I have done lots of reading but it's like a mental block. But I need to write it now, so that after a double seminar tomorrow can write essay no 2 in the afternoon, as both are for Wednesday. Essay number 2 is much easier and I know it will be good, like the two before it, with very minimum effort. But 1 is evil and I really need it to be good, so I know it won't be. 3 is for Friday. Or at least I am physically incapable of writing it before that. Have sort of done presentation, at least.

I am doomed.

P.S. Bought a paid account for the first time in ages and have lots of pretty new icons! Yay!

ETA: Oh and none of my comments have been emailed to me for a while now, has this happened to anyone else? It is very annoying!

It's been a while. Again. I don't really know why I don't post ever, because I check my flist all the time and have a lot of things to say, though perhaps am no longer feeling lj is the best forum for that. Maybe a blog may be the answer. We'll see. I keep taking pictures I want to post, but it's so much effort doing that, maybe I will get a paid account again.

For some reason I only post when I have shit loads of work (THREE essays and a presentation for next week, why do I do this to myself?!) and never anything of substance to say. Hmm.

A brief look at my life right now, nicely categorised and all.

Education: still getting firsts on essays and not speaking in class, had to submit dissertation title and synopsys on Friday, came up with that in the process of filling in the form, oops, inconsistent performance when it comes to presentations.

Friends: somehow balancing Ox and LSE people pretty well, though lately have seen a lot more of the latter, but have been doing lunches with the former, some new people that are a lot of fun.

Travel: Yeah Morocco was very recent and I have no money but am going to Barcelona at the end of term, the whole of my course is going, it is going to be an educational trip, it was the idea of our tutors and we are going to have classes. This is so totally valid!

Love: that dreaded day was only a week ago, was going to post a rant against it but had to get ready to go out and ran out of time, did have a surprisingly fun, drunken and debauched evening, more generally things are confusing me from more than one direction

London: I adore this city, had a plan to do cultural things and that was going pretty well at the start of term with a visit to Tate Modern, the theatre and ballet, but then there was snow and essays, have been walking everywhere, oh how relative distance is

Oxford: went to Oxford for the first time since since finals, it was wonderful of course, beautiful and cold and I realised how much I missed the familiarity of the streets and Univ and the Covered Market and everything else.

Job: nothing to report here, haven't applied anywhere, because I am a failure.

Cinema: Have recently seen Slumdog Millionaire and Milk, though very much enjoyed both, maybe Milk more, thought that may have a lot to do with being in the most luxurious cinema ever.

TV: Heroes: it's okay, the last few eps especially, but I will never forgive them for Nathan, Gossip Girl: continues to be awesome, it's not like I watch it for a realistic representation of teens, L word: can make me really angry, and I know the ending will upset me, but still highly entertaining, Skins S3: I enjoy it, though it really has thrown reality out of the window and contains a character I want to kill.

Fandom: I miss Merlin, have developed a mad love for AUs, maybe will post some recs soon.

That's pretty much it. I will try to drop by more often, so that my entries are not simply lots of info that is of interest to no one,

I am back from Morocco. Well, have been back since Monday, but as it was the first week of term I was thrown a bit off the deep end into classes and seminars and trying to see lots of people and having last minute driving lessons and doing copious amounts of laundry. Am now reading for my first essay for the year (On ethics in foreign policy, this whole choosing your own essay topic thing used to annoy me, but I do love it now) and of course now have found the time to update!

Things are good right now and I am sure that by half way through next week, it will be less good, so I want to record this...

I had driving test number two on Friday and it was raining and dark and horrible and nonetheless...I PASSED! :D Yay, I can now drive and soon there will be insurance and hopefully one day I will learn the way to my house.

In other news Morocco was absolutely fabulous. It started very badly, as it was meant to be 4 of us going, but ended up being only 2, but apart from the minor glitch it was fantastic. Met some awesome people, had a bit of a crazy itinerary (Marrakesh - Ouarzazate - Desert (near Merzouga) - Rissani - Fez - Rabat - Casablanca - Marrakesh) but impossibly it all worked out, spend one night in a bus, one in a Berber tend in the Sahara, two at a friends' girlfriend's flat, one in a room with a stranger I'd met hours earlier and one (innocently) sharing a bed. Saw snow in the mountains, rain in the desert, the sunrise over dunes, the sunset from a camel's back, the markets in Fes and Marrakesh, the mosque in Casablanca, the apartment of a friend of the boyfriend of a friend of the girlfriend of a friend (that was insane). The people were on the whole very nice especially when they don't want to sell you anything but they are not too bad even when they do (esp if you very firmly say no or la in Arabic) speak a million languages and (probably because I was travelling with at least one guy and was never by myself) almost no one did/say anything inappropriate to me.

Best week ever. Highly recommend it as it was really very cheap too, well it can be, as you can fine basic accomodation for under £10 and fantastic food for £1-£2, yeah the food was another high point. They were very nice about making me vegetarian things and even in the desert made me my own tagine (the others had to share) and everything was very delicious, cous cous and tagines are the main things, with lots of root vegetables, fried aubergines, fantastic pitta bread, eggs and lots of herbs. Mmm, getting hungry just thinking about it! And though I didn't buy very much they had lots of beautiful things for sale and I personally enjoy the game that is haggling, especially since I wasn't too bothered about buying specific things, though we did meet a number of people who'd been ripped off (felt very smug when comparing how much we'd spend for the same thing)

Now just need to sort out the 1000s of photos I have taken.

Oh and I am so pleased to see how almost my whole flist has been converted to Merlin! I started watching as soon as ep 1 came out and there was tiny bit of fic, (used to go on to merlinbbc and merlinxarthur after each ep aired to read ALL the reviews/comments and fics, guess that would be no longer possible...) though nothing great and I have looked away for a bit and now suddenly there is lots of fic and it is really good and as a result have been reading Arthur/Merlin AUs till very late at night. Though still not sure where people are posting, as the comms memberships have not grown all that much.

Hope you've all had a great weekend! Have tried but failed to catch up on what I have missed, so please tell me stuff! And Merlin recs wouldn't go unappreciated...

(slightly belated) Happy New Year flist! :D Hope your celebrations were what you wanted! Mine ended up being quite awesome despite the way it began (very delayed train, wait in the cold, misunderstandings and more waiting and worst of all being stuck in a lift with eight other people for 20 minutes because we were too heavy! It was terrifying, though makes for quite a story!) I did end up going to the random rented apartment party which began very civilised with nibbles, polite conversation and wine. But add to that time, liberal quantities of Absinthe and things did get a bit out of hand. With people being sick in beds and me being uncharacteristically brave (again, blame the absinthe) and getting who what I wanted for once. As a result was hangover until the evening of the first and had a midly awkward morning, but despite the bluriness and not enough dancing, it was much with the fun!

Am going to Morocco very early in the am hours, so should be trying to get some sleep now! Am very excited! It is a very spontaneous holiday with people I don't really know that well and only carry on luggage for over a week. I am the sort of person who carries a suitcase for a weekend trip, so packing was sort of scary, but ended up being unexpectedly fun.

*waves* Hope you all had a lovely Christmas etc and have planned a good way of ending the year. Mine was not bad at all (best things I got was a camera, a watch and a chocolate fountain!) and I have spend the last couple of days either shopping (I am too weak to resist the sales, even if I have no money whatsoever, very bad!) or reading Yuletide, and not any work, even though I am going to Morocco in less than a week and need to do some work before that, but never mind that now, here's some recs. I love Yuletide and read everything with which I am even vaguely familiar, so these are a very random mix. In no particular order:

Wimbledon: In Dreams: This is a story set after the ending of the film and it is what I wanted to read ever since I saw the film about three years ago, it is quiet and bittersweet and utterly lovely.

Love Actually: Someone you love: This is about Sarah and Karl after the film ends and it is absolutely perfect. Saved By The Bell: Bayside Revisited: I used to love Saved By the bell, can't quite believe fic exists, but it does and this sees the gang reuniting after 15 years and it was a joy to read from start to finish. Oh nostalgia.

RPF Politicians: Ten Sephirot. Nine and a Half Fingers, Eight Nights, 44 Presidents: Yes this is Rahm Emanual/Barack Obama, but really what makes this fic utterly compelling is the stuff before the slash. Really beautifully written and great characterisation.RPF Pundits: Breaking News: Rahm/Anderson Cooper, need I say more? Okay, this really is a great fic, and you should really, really read it!

Angels in America: I'll find you in the morning sun: This is a fic about Prior after the end of the play, it includes a Louis that finally gets a clue, an incredible Hannah and an always wonderful Belize and it is really fantastic, and what I particularly liked was that the hope. It managed to be realistic without being too bleak. RPF Gossip Girl: Ed Westwick is no Repair man: Ed/Chase is not something I normally seek out, but this has a really great Ed voice and I really enjoyed it.

Shelter: Laying In: It takes off where the film ends and presents us with the hard reality of actually moving in with your boyfriend, who is the brother of your best friend and having to take care of your nephew while trying to attend college and it includes a really great OC.

Little Miss Sunshine: Nine Steps in a Circle: Dwayne and Frank both need to rebuilt their lives and their developing friendship helps them along. I really enjoyed this fic, a great storytelling voice.

The History Boys: Now for a breath I tarry: A fic the follows Scripps through his three years in Oxford, don't want to spoil it, but it (eventually) has a pairing I hadn't really read before and it does it really very well.

Am heading straight to the train station afterwards, as am going there for a conference on emerging powers in international relations. I only just researched the place, and it looks absolutely fantastic.

So, I have become a bit obsessed with fashion, and seeing as I spend half of my time online on fashion blogs I thought I should probably mention it (the other half is spend lurking in rahmbamarama and laughing hysterically and being pretty much in love with Rahm Emanuel, but that's a story for another day) I can blame London or Gossip Girl or the fact that when you spend an hour and a half getting to Uni, it seems worth it spending a little bit longer deciding what to wear in the morning.

I have always loved clothes but my venture into the fashionblog world is very recent and I can blame Gossip Girl on all counts, as I started off looking for GG fashion and things went downhill from there. So from my observation there seem to be two type of fashion blogs (broadly speaking, there are many many more), the type where rich teenage girls spend ludicrous amounts of money on designer labels and include hideous (and insanely high) shoes and lots of studs/leather/fringed things and insane layering and the other is where people use their creativity and combine high street and vintage to end up with pretty awesome stuff. The former reside more often than not in the US, while the latter are often British. I unashamedly love both, though for different reasons.

So let me qualify my love of clothes, before fashion the things that matter most are comfort and warmth. This doesn't mean I am making an excuse for Uggs, because I am not, there is comfort/warmth and then there is UGLY. The latter is taken into consideration. Mostly that means that I don't do heels, they can look hot (for a shoe rant see below) and all, but they also hurt my feet and at 5ft8 I love my flats in every colour ever and BOOTS obviously. Also I have no money so I am very careful about what I buy, though I have somehow acquired a pretty big wardrobe over the years, and love wearing something old and styling it differently than I used to, making it feel almost new.

My fashion loves/current obsession:

Tights. Okay my obsession with tights is still going strong and the fact that coloured/patterned/thick tights seem to be 'in' is so pleasing, as it was much harder to find the perfect shape of purple a year ago. I am pretty much in tights heaven right now.

Dresses and skirts I have always loved, but recently I have pretty much stopped wearing trousers, or at least long trousers, and when I put on the occasional pair of jeans I put a dress over it, so it doesn't really count. I love that it is perfectly acceptable to put on a summer dress over a black jumper and tights and have been doing that a lot lately.

I love this season when you can wear lots of layers and jumpers and warm things, combine this with my love of dresses you can guess that I am pretty fond of jumper dresses. Fantastic worn with bright tights and boots.

Belts, especially waist clinching belts are a huge current favourite of mine, have been using them to add to the highwasted 50s inspired silhouette I've been loving. You know high wasted full skirts, tucked in blouse? Yeah it took me a while to get used to the highwastedness, too many bad flashbacks to my childhood, but am so on board right now.

Bright colours, in contrasting/clashing shades and clashing patterns/styles, think biker jacket with a tutu, not that I have either.

My fashion needs/wants

Harlequin patterns, I would sell my soul for this dress, but since that's not gonna happen this skirt would do nicely.

Oxford booties, preferably vintage, definitely with a small heel. I want some so much, but am yet to find the perfect pair, that is with a 2 inch heel rather than 4, as that would kill me.

Tall black flat boots (rain proof a must) which fit snugly around my calves, seriously looks like I will have to splash out on some as the cheap ones I find are always really big on me and make my legs all stick like and upsets me, apart from that requirement I am pretty easy, lace ups would be fantastic, or buckles, though smooth would probably be most versatile.

A bandage dress, I need to find out where one can get good Herve Leger knock offs, preferably super multicoloured, (google Lindsay Lohan and Herve Leger to see what I mean)

My fashion hates

The recent shoe/boot hybrids, like open toed boots and the like, and the general trend of really ugly shoes, bulky, inbuilt platforms, what I used to call hooker shoes do not make pretty footwear. Lots os studs, fur and suede fringes and really futuristic/alien meet cowboy look is just really ugly. :( Really ugly and it upsets me. I know I am not into heels, but I like pretty shoes or kickass shoes but not open toed boots, because some things are just wrong. If you don't know what I mean, you are living in blessed ignorance, nonetheless go here to find out. Wow, that was a bit of a rant.

Leggings. Yeah the line between tights and leggings is fine, but significant, I am proud to say I don't own a single pair of leggings and I especially hate leggings as trousers worn with a short top. No. Just no. Though a secret part of me is sort of in awe of the shiny metallic and/or leather-like ones but not enough to buy any, but certainly to secretly admire from afar.

Jumpsuits/playsuits, whatever you want to call them they are 9 out of 10 times really awful. There are exceptions, and as much as I dislike Katy Perry, she can pull off a jumpsuit, but that doesn't meant that you can.

Dropcrotch pants (oh god, I keep saying pants instead of trousers, I am ashamed but will stop correcting myself) oh god, why? WHY? They are just so unflattering and hideous and never look good on anyone ever.

What else? Oh yeah I have crazy amount of work and so no time to go shopping ever, which is sad, I so long to go charity shopping in London, but maybe in December. Oh and some trends look good in theory and fail in reality, thigh high socks are one of those fails for me, as they kept slipping down, meaning I had to pull them up every few steps, making walking pretty uncomfortable. Also, I keep wanting to keep a 'daily wear' diary, but am not sure where my camera is.

That is all, not that anyone cared. But I have been thinking a lot about these things recently and needed to say them in order to get on with my presentation.

ETA: What do you think? Do you agree/disagree? Think I am the shallowest person ever? (I am a bit ashamed about posting this, in fact wasn't going to when I started writing it, was meant to be just for me, but then there were bullet points and I had to share)

So, we are in the dawn of a new beginning, I am terrified and excited and hopeful that despite all it will be okay, it has to be! Yeah, you guessed it, tomorrow I have to do my first presentation at the LSE in front of a group of super smart, but hopefully sleep deprived people. Oh yeah there is the US election too...

I can't concentrate and have done no work at all, instead reading all types of election-related news, and keep thinking I will be staying up anyway, so can do my presentation then. So no fun election party for me, but hopefully a celebration tomorrow! I looked at my post from four years ago, it was half way through the next day that the result was announced, so I sort of can't help but expect a similar thing, but I am also cautiously optimistic, because things are looking pretty okay, are they not? But then again I have never met a Republican, all the Americans at the LSE (and there are a lot here) I know are Democrats, and same goes for everyone else I know, so I have never actually spoken to a McCain supporter. Add to this, where I choose to get my news from, and you get a very nice, liberal sheltered picture. So my glimpse into conservative America has been formed by trollish comments left on blogs or youtube, and thus seem almost unreal in their craziness. But these people are very real and in their millions, which is scary. Similarly it is all good to laugh at Palin on SNL or even feel sorry for her after the prank, but the possibility of her actually being VP is all kinds of awful, I was reading an article on the Bush doctrine and its consequences the other day and it is terrifying to think that she didn't know what it was. Among many, many other things of course, but as someone who is currently studying international relations and is very much aware of the impact the US has on pretty much everything, I can't help but worry. This election matters. It matters not only for Americans but for the rest of the world, and I really wish I could do something more than fervently hope the right choice is made.